It has been also in the Finland forum. http://www.finlandforum.org/bb/viewtopic.php?t=23415

As an American, asking them what they really thought that they MIGHT do in the future – after a steady resistance to employment for years – they shrugged, for who cares? Sucker workers keep on paying them to sit around and do little, or even lets them travel abroad! (through a little sneakiness, hiding that they are out of the country…) In two cases, it was women in their 40′s having kids, one by adopting a girl from South China, getting five years off work, fully paid, automatically.

Crazy country. No wonder no one smiles on the Metro – they’re slaves for the the Somalis, the dropouts, the other welfare bums.

Mary

It is you who has things a little mixed up. You only need to apply for a loan (and have collateral) for the selling price. Of course, you also need to afford the housing company mortgage payments but that is a different thing altogether.

What do you imagine being the point of a housing company loan if you need collateral for the entire price?

Well, “just a pulse” may be a bit of an exaggeration. If you just call the banks, they might give you the cold shoulder, but I know some people who got a loan with zero savings and zero collateral, including a couple with only one breadwinner.

Sigh.. You’ve gotten things a little bit mixed up.

Myyntihinta (selling price) is what the seller of the apartment wants – it may or may not contain the debt of the housing company (“velkaosuus”). In many cases the previous owner(s) has already paid the housing company debt and thus, myyntihinta and “velaton myyntihinta” (selling price and debt of the housing company combined) are the same.

However, if that is not the case (common with new apartments), selling price can be, for example, 135000 but the debtless selling price can be a LOT more depending on how much of housing company’s debt is still unpaid. And here is the important point: the remaining housing company’s debt transfers to the next (or new) to-be-owner automatically.

Just an example from etuovi.com, a new 100,5m^2 semi detached house in Espoo:

Velaton hinta: 248471,00 €
Myyntihinta: 74175,00 €
Velkaosuus: 174296,00 €

The apartment is not yours if you’ve got 75000 euros in your pocket – it’s yours if you have 250000 euros – that is the total price you’ll pay in the end. If you don’t have any savings, you need a loan for 250000 euros… and “just a pulse” won’t do it.

“What, do you imagine that all first time buyers in the Helsinki area are millionaires? Take a reality check by running a few searches on etuovi.com.”

Maybe not millionaires, but people buying apartments which cost 400000 euros (velaton myyntihinta) are pretty well off.

In most new developments, the loan is divided between the buyer and the housing company. Hence the difference in the selling price and the total price. 400,000 is actually a pretty typical total price for a new semi-detached home in Espoo, for example. The selling price can be as little as a third of that. The banks are all too happy to dish out a loan of 133,000 to just about anything with a pulse.

What, do you imagine that all first time buyers in the Helsinki area are millionaires? Take a reality check by running a few searches on etuovi.com.

Yeah, except that a couple pulling 45000 euros together (or even 90000) is not going to buy a house costing 400000 euros, let alone even dream of a loan for 415000 euros.

People who buy 400000 euro houses are people who can afford it. It’s as simple as that.

This is assuming once their probation time is up they don’t spend the entire day hovering by the coffee machine, sucking it down by the potful and letting everyone else (i.e. their boss, the only person really invested in the business) do all the work. For a “Lutheran” work ethic, I just don’t really see the work ethic. Granted, I have only lived here under a year. But good lord….

For the rest of us that work our asses off, it’s not so much the wanting more money, I just want a nicer quality of life to spend more time with family and friends, without feeling like I want to shoot something after leaving work.

Don’t spend too much time worrying about people who milk the system…they are really actually quite few, and your payment to them is minimal….
GET BACK TO WORK!

Wow, for once I’m actually agreeing with you. SAK members are pretty much untouchable but the rest of us… we’d better keep the boss happy.

I also have to agree with Phil on the crippling effect of the welfare state. Our socialist system depends on the same people it’s trying to get rid of: people with money. So as a result even our middle class has to pay depressingly high taxes.

Hey, it’s a bubble. It’s not supposed to make any sense. People are desperate to get into the market as “tomorrow it will be even more expensive”. The same thing was going on in 1988-90. The market was actually cooling already before the recession hit and things turned really nasty. Check this (PDF) for real price development (Kuvio 3). Housing prices have long been cyclic and highly volatile in Finland, especially in the Helsinki area. Buyer beware.

Instead of buying that dream home by Kehä III under the power lines, hold on to your downtown flat, or if you’re really adventurous, cash in on the bubble and rent for a few years…

Actually, it pretty darn close is, assuming that other employees make about the same I do. This is public information, you know. We’re talking about gross salaries of 40-50k vis-a-vis 300k.

In this country employment is legally a more bonding relationship than marriage (I am serious). The amount of regluations and rules associated with employment is absurd.

Perhaps, but you can happily ignore them as long as your employees are not SAK members. It’s not like anyone will care.

And, Tom, at over 400k, I expect either a really find house with plenty of amenities or some land with it….I don’t particularly want to be able to watch my neighbours taking a dump from my kitchen windown. I still don’t understand why and/or how people are forking over this kind of cash for homes in Helsinki.